The Boston Anti-Authoritarian Movement's 21st newsletter celebrates May Day 2009.

"In the U.S. in the late 1800s, workers in general and migrant workers in particular
faced abysmal conditions on the job. Workers, including children, could suffer 16 or more hours a day under dangerous, stifling sweatshop conditions to earn starvation wages and live in cramped quarters. Like today, workers poured in from all over the world to pursue the American Dream through their own honest labor. Workers came from Ireland, Italy, Germany, China, Russia, Japan, Spain, Mexico, Norway, Syria, Slovakia, Poland and elsewhere in search of better lives. When they arrived, however, they faced blatant racism and hate, just like migrant workers do today. Eking out hard livings in tight-knit ethnic communities, most were considered second-class citizens, regarded as diseased criminals, untrustworthy scoundrels and, more importantly, a cheap and dispensable source of labor..." (download PDF for full article)